HIKING THE GRAND CANYON RIM TO RIM

The trail requires stamina, but the real trick is getting across the river

If you go

Be prepared: Backpacking on the noncorridor trails of the canyon demands experience, stamina and route-finding skills. There are no trail markers on the North and South Bass Trails, no campfires, and water is scarce.

When to go: Hiking in spring and fall will help avoid the canyon’s notorious heat. Required permits become available four months before your desired month, so plan to apply beginning June 1 for an October trip or Dec. 1 for an April trip.

Orientation: Both trail heads for the Bass Trails are remote and require four-wheel-drive vehicles. The North Bass Trail head is on the North Rim at Swamp Point. A North Kaibab National Forest map is needed. The South Bass Trail head is about 30 miles northwest of Grand Canyon Village. Use a map of the Tusayan Ranger District of the Kaibab National Forest.

A National Park Service ranger rows backpacker Kevin Horan (rear right) and fellow hiker Chris Walker across the Colorado River during a rim-to-rim trek across the Grand Canyon. Chris Walker • Chicago Tribune

A National Park Service ranger rows backpacker Kevin Horan (rear right) and fellow hiker Chris Walker across the Colorado River during a rim-to-rim trek across the Grand Canyon. Chris Walker • Chicago Tribune

GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK 
The Grand Canyon’s beauty beckons like gravity, pulling even the timid to the chasm’s edge.

But for those committing to the challenge of a cross-canyon hike, there awaits below the rim a reward beyond the spectacular scenery: time travel.

Those horizontal stripes on the postcard panoramas trace a billion years of geological history. They are the sediment and fossils of ancient oceans. According to author Scott Thybony, who literally wrote the books on canyon trails, to hike the canyon is to go back an average of 100,000 years with each downward step. When the cell signal is gone, the world is quiet and the mind centers on the simple: food, water and the next footstep.

“There’s something special about being in the canyon,” said Mark Wunner, supervisor at the park’s Backcountry Information Center. “I get excited just thinking about it.”

Our party of four wanted just that kind of primal peace, and we were willing to burn a lot of cash and fossil fuel in the pursuit. We planned our trip for early October of last year on the historic North and South Bass Trails, which start at the north and south rims and meet at the Colorado River. But we wanted to cross the 18-mile-wide canyon without having to backtrack to a car. “The point,” explained fellow hiker Byron Moffett, of Langley, Wash., “is to see all the trails without having to repeat them.”

The solution was to break into pairs in different vehicles, each driving an SUV to a trail head. The North Bass party (Kevin Horan, of Langley, and me, from Evanston, Ill.) and the South Bass party (Moffett and Scott Mcneil, also of Langley) would hike down, meet at the river, exchange car keys and hike up the other side to the vehicle left by the other party. Simple.

Except for one thing. How does one cross a fast-moving, cold river?

“The safe way is to hitchhike,” Wunner advised. “You wait for a ride (from rafters), and jump up and down when you see somebody coming. It’s not something that’s written about in the guide books.” OK, we thought. We’ll try that.